1. Joshua Kopelman is an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and philanthropist.
18 Facts About Josh Kopelman
1. 2.
Josh Kopelman was the founder of First Round Capital, and before that, a founder of Half.
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Josh Kopelman was chairman of the board of The Philadelphia Inquirer from 2015 to 2024, when he was elected chair emeritus.
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Josh Kopelman grew up in Great Neck, New York on Long Island, the son of Carol and Dr Richard Josh Kopelman.
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Josh Kopelman's father was a professor at Baruch College and his mother a real estate broker.
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Josh Kopelman attended the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1993 with a BS in Entrepreneurial Management and Marketing.
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In 1992, during his sophomore year at the Wharton School, Josh Kopelman co-founded Infonautics, based in Wayne, Pennsylvania.
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Three years later, in 1999, Josh Kopelman left Infonautics to found Half.
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In 2004, Josh Kopelman co-founded TurnTide, an anti-spam technology company that was acquired by Symantec within six months of its founding.
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In 2004 Josh Kopelman was the co-founder of First Round Capital, a seed-stage venture fund.
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In 2007, Josh Kopelman helped to coin the phrase the "implicit web" to describe the Semantic Web.
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Josh Kopelman joined the board of the Philadelphia Media Network, later The Philadelphia Inquirer, in 2015.
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Josh Kopelman finished his term in June 2024 after reaching his term limit.
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Josh Kopelman was elected by the board to a three-year term as chair emeritus.
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In 2008, Josh Kopelman ranked 3rd on the New York Times list of Top Venture Capitalists and has ranked in the top 20 of the Forbes Midas List of the top 100 tech investors, including 18th in 2011,6th in 2012,12th in 2013,11th in 2014,4th in 2015,6th in 2016,35th in 2017,19th in 2018,39th in 2019, and 79th in 2020.
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In 2007, Josh Kopelman was named one of "Tech's New Kingmakers" by Business 2.0 magazine, as a "Rising VC Star" by Fortune magazine in 2008, and as one of the top ten angel investors in the United States by Newsweek in 2014.
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In 1995, Josh Kopelman married Rena Cohen, an attorney, in Great Neck, New York.
18.
In 2002, the Josh Kopelman Foundation funded a project to digitize and host the complete text of the Jewish Encyclopedia online.